Heavy Smokers at Risk for Deadly Kidney Cancer

Smoking is linked to heart disease, stroke and in the case of cancer, begins in the lung where it is inhaled.
Dr. Thomas Polascik of Duke University's Cancer Institute says the smoke travels through the lungs, the bloodstream and makes its way eventually to the kidneys, where tumors can grow quite large before they are detected.
"Unless a patient has some sort of pain or perhaps blood in the urine, it may not come to their attention," Dr. Polascik stated.
Often the patient comes into the hospital emergency room with abdominal pain or indigestion, and an imaging device like the MRI or CT scan identifies the tumor.
Previous research had already established the connection between tobacco use and kidney cancer, but the scientists at Duke University studied the medical records of more than 800 patients who had undergone surgery and found something more serious: the onset of advanced kidney cancer.
Dr. Polascik says the kidney cancer patients were divided into three groups, current and former smokers and those who never smoked.  Their risk of advanced kidney cancer was based on two factors, how much they smoked every day and over how long a period of time.
Heavy Smokers at Risk for Deadly Kidney Cancer